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Cold War begins
The Rivarly between the United States and the Soviety Union following World War II that led to massive growth in nuclear weapons on both sides. The cold war divided th West and led to political persecution in many areas, even in the wealthy and secure United States. -
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Cold War
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Creation of the United Nations
The creation of the United Nations in 1945 heralded an era of international cooperation. Around the world Colonial peoples won independence from European masters, while in the United States the civil rights movement gained new momentum. -
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USSR
With new geopolitical needs, the USSR repressed democratic coalition governments of liberals, socialists, communists, and peasant parties in central and eastern Europe. It imposed Communist rule almost immediately in Bulgaria and Romania. -
Stalin's new 5 year plan
Stalin's new five year plan set increased production goals and mandated more stringent collectivization of agriculture. Rapid recovery meant more work, more order and no greater freedom. Stalin cut back the army by two thirds to beef up the labor force and also turned his attention to the low birthrate. He introduced an intense propaganda campaign emphasziing that women should hold down jobs and also raise more children. -
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Divided Germany
Berlin, controlled by the United States, Great Britain, France and the Soviet Union- was deep in the Soviet zone of occupation and became a major point of contention among the former allies. When the USSR blockaded the western half of the city, the US responded with a massive airlift. To stop movement between the two zones, the USSR built a wall in 1961 and used troops to patrol it. -
French Consitution
The French approved a consitutution in 1946 that established the Fourth Republic and finally granted the vote to French women. Leader General De Gaulle wanted a more conservative political system with a strong executive. -
Marshall Plan
United States devised the Marshall Plan, a program of massive economic aid to Europe to relieve ordinary people of the hardships that were making communism attractive. This played an imporant role in the rebirth of European prosperity in the 1950s. -
Yugoslavia
Under the communist ruler Tito, Yugoslavia was the only exception to the Soviet sweep in eastern Europe. After the war he dre on support from Serbs, Croats, and Muslims to mount a communist revolution. This revolution was meant to avoid Soviet influence. Developing socialism in their country in somewhat different forms. Yugoslavia emerged the revolution as a culturally diverse federation of six republics and two independent provinces within Serbia. -
United States as a powerhouse
The United States was the richest nation in the world. Its industrial output had increased by a remarkable 15 percent annually. By 1947 the US controlled almost two thirds of the world's gold bullion and launched more than half of the worlds commercial shipping. -
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Partition of Palestine and the Creation of Israel
The creation of the Jewish state of Israel in 1948 against a backdrop of ongoing wars among Jews and indigenous arab peoples made the Middle East a power keg. The struggle for resources and for securing the borders of viable nation-states was the main goal. -
Truman Doctrine
Truman reacted to the Communist threat in Greece by announcing what quickly became known as the Truman Doctrine, the countering of political crises with economic and military aid. -
India Split
In 1947 India was created for Hindus, and Pakistan which would be divided into two parts for Muslims. During the independence years political tensions rose creating differences between the two religions. -
Britain Ceded Palestine
In 1947 an exhausted Britain ceded Palestine to the newly created United Nations, which voted to partition Palestine into an Arab region and a Jewish one. Conflicting claims led to war, and Jewish Military forces prevailed. -
Czechoslovakia
IN the Autumn of 1947, a purge of non-Communist officials began in Czechoslovakia. By June of 1948, Czechoslovakia's socialist president, Edvard Benes, had resigned and been replaced by a Communist Figurehead. -
Creation of a West Germany
In response to the creation of a West German state by the Western allies, the USSR established an East Germany state a few months later. -
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Operation Vitttles
The United States responded decisively to the Soviet blockade, by flying millions of tons of provisions. The Berlin airlift also known as Operatiokn Vittles, the pilots funneled in coal to warm milliones of isolated Berliners. -
Soviets blockade Germany's capital
In response to the US enlisting many former Nazi officials as spies and bureaucrats to jump-start the economy and pursure the cold war. Stalin retaliated by using Soviet troops to blockade Germany's capital, Berlin. The city had been divided into four occupation zones, even though it was located more than one hundred miles deep into the Soviet zone and was cut off from the western territory. -
NATO
The United States, Canada, and their allies in western Europe and Scandinavia fromed the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). NATO provided a unified military force for its member countries. -
Creation of the German Federal Republic
Centrist politicians helped create a new state, the German Federal Republic whose consititution aimed to prevent the emergence of a dictator and to guarentee individiual rights. -
Communist takeover in China
A Communist takeover in China brought in a government led by Mao Zedong that was no longer the plaything of the traditional colonial powers. Mao instituted reforms such as civil equality for women but also imposed Soviet-style collectivization, rapid industrialization and brutal repression of the privileged classes. -
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Korean War
In 1950 the North Koreans, with the support of the Soviet Union, invaded U.S- backed South Korea. After two and a half years of a horrible destructive stalemate the opposing sides finally agreed to a settlement in 1953. Korea would remain split at its prewar border, the thirty-eighth parallel. -
ECSC
In 1951 Italy, France, West Germany, Belgium, Luxembourg and the Netherlands took a major step toward cooperation when the formed the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC) which was an organization to manage the joint production of basic resources. -
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Decolonization of Africa
The liberation of Africa from European rule was an uneven process, sometimes occuring peacefully and at other times demanding armed struggle to drive out European settlers, governments, and armies. The difficult process of nation building following liberation involved setting up state institutions, including educational and other services. Creating national unity out of many ethinicities took a lot of work to get people of differen colonials to work together -
Jawaharlal Nehru
Prime Minister of India, led his newly independent country of India from 1947 to 1964 dyring its first years of freedom from British rule. Nehru chose to maintain India and keep it as a neutral country during the cold war. -
Death of Stalin
Stalin dies, and it became clear that the old ways would not hold. Political prisoners in the labor camps rebelled, leading to the release of more than a million people from the Gulag. -
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The Vietnam War
After the Geneva Conference of 1954, which divided Vietnam into North and South, the US increased its support for the corrupt and incompetent leaders of non-Communist South Vietnam. North Vietnam, China, and the Soviety Union backed the rebel Vietcong. -
SEATO
As a counterpart to Nato: the U.S backed southeast Asia treaty organization established in 1954. As an important effect of the Korean War was the rapid reindustrialization of Japan to provide the United States with supplies. -
Indochina
The cold war spread to Indochina, where nationalists had been struggling against the postwar revival of French Imperialism. Their leader, Ho Chi Minh preached both nationalism and socialism and built a powerful organization, the Viet Minh, to fight colonial rule. -
Warsaw Pact
After the United States forced France and Britain to invite West Germany to join NATO, the Soviet Union retaliated by establishing with its satellite countries the military organization commonly called the Warsaw Pact. -
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Nikita Khrushchev
In 1955 Nikita Khrushchev emerged to be the leader of the USSR from 1955 until his dismissal in 1964. Known for his speech denouncing Stalin, creation of the "thaw" and participation in the Cuban Missle Crisis. -
Poland and Hungarian Protests
Discontented Polish railroad wokers struck for better wages. Influenced by the Polish protests, HUngarians rebelled against forced collectivization in October 1956 " The golden october" they would call their uprising. -
Sputnik
In 1957 the Soviets successfully launched the first artificial earth satellite, Sputnik, and in 1961 they put the first cosmonaut, Yuri Gagarin in orbit around the earth. -
Treaty of Rome
The Six ECSC members signed the Treaty of Rome, which provided for a more general trading partnership called the European Economic Community (EEC) also known as the Common Market. The EEC reduced tariffs among the six partners and developed common trade policies. -
Fidel Castro
Communist leader Fidel Castro had come to power by overthrowing the corrupt government of the dictator Fulgencio Batista. After being rebuffed by the United States, Castro aligned his new government with the Soviet Union. -
JFK becomes president
Kennedy represented American affluence and youth yet also the nation's commitment to cold war. Kennedy escalated the Cold war, with the occurance with the nearby island of Cuba. -
Creation of the Berlin Wall
In 1961 the USSR demanded the construction of a massive wall that physically divided the city of Berlin in half. -
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Vatican II
A Catholic Council held between 1962 to 1965 to modernize some aspects of Church teachings, to update the liturgy, and to promote cooperation. -
Cuban Missile Crisis
Tensions came to a head in the Cuban Missile Crisis, when the CIA reported the installation of silos to house Soviet Medium-range missiles in Cuba. Kennedy responded forcefully, ordering a naval blockade of ships headed for cuba demanding removal of the installations. -
Test-ban treaty
In the summer of 1963 the United States and the Soviety Union signed a test-ban treaty outlawing the explosion of nuclear weapons in the atmosphere and in the seas. Allowing the superpowers to back away from the brink. -
Wily Brandt
The socialist mayor of West Berlin, became the foreign minister in 1966 and pursued an end to frigid relations with Communist East Germany in order to open up commerce across borders. Ostopolitik, gave west german business leaders what they wanted: the depoliticization of Germany's foreign trade. -
Tet Offensive
On the First day of Tet, the Vietnamese New Year, the Vietcong and the North Vietnamese attacked more than one hundred South Vietnamese attacked more than one hundred South Vietnamese towns and American bases, inflicting heavy casualities. This offense led many people to believe that the war might be unwinnable. -
Richard Nixon
Elected President Richard Nixon promised to bring peace to southeast Asia, but in 1970 he ordered U.S troops to invade Cambodia, the side of the North Vietnamese bases. -
The 1968 Revolt in Prague
The revolt in Prague began within the Czechoslovak Communist party itself. As head of the Slovak Branch Alexander Dubcek had called for more social and political openness. Czech citizens begane to dream about a new society, one based on socialism with a human face. Dubcek was voted to the top and he quickly changed the Communist style of government by ending censorship. Failing to attend a meeting of the Warsaw pact, Soviet tanks rolled into Prague in 1968. -
Brezhnev Doctrine
Soviets announced the Brezhenv doctrine, which state that reform movements of all socialist countries, would face swift represiion. -
Mikhail Gorbachev
Mikhail Gorbachev the new leader of the Soviet Union, he instituted reforms such as glasnosta dn perestroika, thereby contributing to the collapes of Communist rule in the Soviet Bloc and the USSR. -
Fall of the Berlin Wall
In the summer of 1989 crowds of East Germans flooded the borders to escape the crumbling Soviet bloc, and hundreds of thousands of protesters rallied throughout the faill against the regime. Fall of the Berlin Wall symbolized the end of the Cold War, even though the USSR still stood as a bulwark of communism.